While we may be sure that these factors, the religion of the Magi, the practice of magic, and the astrological art, all counted in the composition of the worship of Mithras, we yet know but very little of its tenets. No work has come down to us from any devotee of Mithras which will give us the same light on the way his worshippers regarded him that the romance of Apuleius and the encomium of Aelius Aristides have cast on the mental attitude of the devotees of the Alexandrian cult. The extensive books of Eubulus and Pallas on Mithras and the history of his worship, which Porphyry tells us were extant from the reign of Hadrian down to his own time[[814]], are entirely lost, and our only source of information, except a very few scattered notices in the Fathers and in profane writers like the Emperor Julian and Porphyry himself, are the sculptures and inscriptions which have been found in his ruined chapels. These texts and monuments the scholarly care of M. Cumont has gathered into two large volumes, which will always remain the chief source from which later enquirers must draw their materials[[815]]. From their study he comes to the conclusion that, in the religion of Mithras, there figured above him the Mazdean gods of good and evil respectively called in the Zend Avesta Ahura Mazda and Angro Mainyus, or in more familiar language, Ormuzd and Ahriman. Behind and above these again, he would place a Supreme Being called Zervan Akerene or Boundless Time, who seems to be without attributes or qualities, and to have acted only as the progenitor of the opposing couple. This is at first sight very probable, because the Orphic doctrine, which, as we have seen, made Chronos or Time the progenitor of all the gods, was widely spread in Asia Minor before Alexander’s Conquest, and the Persian colonies formed there under his successors must therefore have come in frequent contact with this most accommodating of schools[[816]]. Traditions of a sect of Zervanists in Western Asia, who taught that all things came from Infinite Time, are also to be found[[817]]. But most of these are recorded after Mithraism had become extinct; and M. Cumont’s proofs of the existence of this dogma in the European religion of Mithras can be reduced on final analysis to a quotation from a treatise by Theodore, the Christian bishop of Mopsuestia who died in 428 A.D., directed, as it would seem, against the “Magi” of his time, in which he admits that their dogmas had never been written, and that the sectaries in question, whom he calls Magusaeans, said “sometimes one thing and deceived themselves, and sometimes another and deceived the ignorant[[818]].” M. Cumont’s identification of the lion-headed statue often found in Mithraic chapels with the Supreme God of the system has been shown elsewhere to be open to serious question, and the figure itself to be susceptible of another interpretation than that which he would put upon it[[819]]. On the whole, therefore, while M. Cumont’s mastery of his subject makes it very dangerous to differ from him, it seems that his theory of a Boundless Time as the pinnacle of the Mithraist pantheon cannot be considered as proved.
Whether Ormuzd and Ahriman played any important part in the Roman worship of Mithras is also doubtful. With regard to the first-named, both Greeks and Romans knew him well and identified him unhesitatingly with Zeus and Jupiter[[820]]. Hence we should expect to find him, if represented at all on the Mithraic sculptures, with the well-known features, the thunderbolt, and the eagle, which long before this time had become the conventional attributes of the Roman as well as of the Homeric father of gods and men. We are not entirely disappointed, for we find in a bas-relief formerly in a chapel of Mithras at Sissek (the ancient Sissia in Pannonia) and now in the Museum at Agram, the bull-slaying scene in which Mithras figures and which will be presently described, surmounted by an arch on which is ranged Jupiter seated on his throne, grasping the thunderbolt, wielding the sceptre, and occupying the place of honour in a group of gods among whom we may distinguish Mars and Mercury[[821]]. In another bas-relief of the same scene, now at the Rudolfinum in Klagenfurt, he is depicted in a similar position in an assembly of the gods, which although much mutilated seems to show Zeus or Jupiter in the centre with Hera or Juno by his side[[822]]. But the most conclusive of these monuments is the great bas-relief found at Osterburken in the Odenwald, wherein the arch surmounting the usual bull-slaying scene contains an assembly of twelve gods with Zeus in the centre armed with thunderbolt and sceptre, while around him are grouped Apollo, Ares, Heracles, Hera, Athena, Aphrodite, Nike, Poseidon, Artemis, Hades, and perhaps Persephone[[823]]. When by the side of these we put the many inscriptions left by the legionaries to “the holy gods of the fatherland, to Jupiter best and greatest, and to the Unconquered One”; to “Jupiter best and greatest, and to the divine Sun, the Unconquered Sun,” and other well-known names of Mithras, there can be no doubt that his worshippers used to adore him together with the head of the Roman Pantheon, and that they considered Mithras in some way the subordinate of or inferior to Jupiter[[824]]. Yet there is nothing to show that the Mithraists as such identified in any way this Jupiter Optimus Maximus with the Persian Ahura Mazda, Oromasdes, or Ormuzd, or that they ever knew him by any of these outlandish names.
The case is different with Ormuzd’s enemy Ahriman, who evidently was known by his Persian name to the Roman worshippers of Mithras. In the Vatican can be seen a triangular marble altar dedicated by a clarissimus named Agrestius who was a high-priest of Mithras, to “the god Arimanius[[825]],” and altars with similar inscriptions have been found at Buda-Pesth[[826]]. At a Mithraic chapel in York also, there was found a statue, now in the Museum of the Philosophical Society in that city, which bears an inscription to the same god Arimanius[[827]]. There is therefore fairly clear evidence that the Mithraists recognized Ahriman under his Persian name, and that they sacrificed to him, as Plutarch said the “magi” of his time did to the god whom he calls Hades[[828]], and this agrees with Herodotus’ statement that the Persians used to do the same to “the god who is said to be beneath the earth[[829]].” Although this gave occasion to the Christian Fathers to accuse the Mithraists of worshipping the devil, we are not thereby bound to conclude that they looked upon Arimanius as an essentially evil being. It seems more probable that they considered him, as the Greeks did their Hades or Pluto, as a chthonian or subterranean power ruling over a place of darkness and discomfort, where there were punishments indeed, but not as a deity insusceptible of propitiation by sacrifice[[830]], or compulsion by other means such as magic arts[[831]]. It has been shown elsewhere that his image in a form which fairly represents his attributes in this capacity appears with some frequency in the Mithraic chapels, where a certain amount of mystery attached to its exhibition[[832]]. It seems to follow from these considerations that the worshippers of Mithras attributed to their special god no inferiority to Ahriman as M. Cumont’s argument supposes, and that the only power whom they acknowledged as higher than Mithras himself was the Roman equivalent of Ormuzd, the Jupiter Optimus Maximus adored throughout the Roman Empire of their time as the head of the Pantheon[[833]].
The connection of Mithras with the sun is also by no means easy to unravel. The Vedic Mitra was, as we have seen, originally the material sun itself, and the many hundreds of votive inscriptions left by the worshippers of Mithras to “the unconquered Sun Mithras[[834]],” to the unconquered solar divinity (numen) Mithras[[835]], to the unconquered Sun-God (deus) Mithra[[836]], and allusions in them to the priests (sacerdotes), worshippers (cultores), and temples (templum) of the same deity leave no doubt open that he was in Roman times a sun-god[[837]]. Yet this does not necessarily mean that he was actually the day-star visible to mankind, and the Greeks knew well enough how to distinguish between Apollo the god of light who was once at any rate a sun-god, and Helios the Sun itself[[838]]. On the Mithraic sculptures, we frequently see the unmistakable figure of Mithras riding in the chariot of the Sun-God driven by the divinity with long hair and a rayed nimbus, whom we know to be this Helios or his Roman equivalent, going through some ceremony of consecration with him, receiving messages from him, and seated side by side with him at a banquet which is evidently a ritual feast. M. Cumont explains this by the theory that Mithras, while in Persia and in the earliest Aryan traditions the genius of the celestial light only[[839]], no sooner passed into Semitic countries and became affected by the astrological theories of the Chaldaeans, than he was identified with their sun-god Shamash[[840]], and this seems as reasonable a theory as can be devised. Another way of accounting for what he calls the “at first sight contradictory proposition” that Mithras at once was and was not the sun[[841]], is to suppose that while the Mithraists wished those who did not belong to their faith to believe that they themselves worshipped the visible luminary, they yet instructed their votaries in private that he was a deity superior to it and in fact the power behind it. As we shall see, the two theories are by no means irreconcilable, although absolute proof of neither can yet be offered.
One can speak with more certainty about the Legend or mythical history of Mithras which M. Cumont has contrived with rare acumen to reconstruct from the monuments found in his chapels. It is comprised in eleven or twelve scenes or tableaux which we will take in their order[[842]]. We first see the birth of the god, not from the head of his father Zeus like Athena, or from his thigh like Dionysos, but from a rock, which explains his epithet of “Petrogenes” or rock-born. The god is represented in this scene as struggling from the rock in which he is embedded below the waist, and always uplifts in one hand a broad knife of which we shall afterwards see him make use, and in the other a lighted torch[[843]]. He is here represented as a boy, and wears the Phrygian cap or so-called cap of liberty which is his distinctive attribute, while the torch is doubtless, as M. Cumont surmises, symbolical of the light which he is bringing into the world[[844]]. The rock is sometimes encircled by the folds of a large serpent, probably here as elsewhere a symbol of the earth, and is in the Mithraic chapel discovered at Housesteads in Northumberland represented in the form of an egg, the upper part remaining on the head of the nascent god like an egg-shell on that of a newly-hatched chicken[[845]]. This is probably due to some confusion or identification with the Orphic legend of the First-born or Phanes who sprang from the cosmic egg; but the central idea of the rock-birth seems to be that of the spark, hidden as it were in the stone and leaping forth when struck. In one or two examples of the scene, the miraculous birth is watched by a shepherd or shepherds, which leads M. Cumont to draw a parallel between this and the Adoration of the Shepherds at the Birth of Christ.
The next two scenes are more difficult to interpret with anything approaching certainty. In one of them[[846]], Mithras is represented as standing upright before a tree from which he cuts or tears a large branch bearing leaves and fruit. He is here naked, save for the distinctive cap; but immediately after, he is seen emerging from the leafage fully clothed in Oriental dress. In the next scene—the relative order of the scenes seems settled by the places they most often occupy on different examples of the same sculptures[[847]]—Mithras in the Phrygian cap, Persian trousers, and flowing mantle generally worn by him, kneels on one knee drawing a bow, the arrows from which strike a rock in the distance and draw from it a stream of water which a kneeling man receives in his hands and lifts to his mouth[[848]]. Several variants of this scene exist, in one of which a suppliant is kneeling before the archer-god and raising his hands towards him as if in prayer; while in another, the rock may well be a cloud. M. Cumont can only suggest with regard to these scenes, that the first may be an allusion to the Fall of Man and his subsequently clothing himself with leaves as described in the Book of Genesis, and that the second scene may depict a prolonged drought upon earth, in which man prays to Mithras and is delivered by the god’s miraculous production of rain. He admits, however, that this is pure conjecture, and that he knows no Indian, Persian, or Chaldaean legend or myth to which the scenes in question can be certainly attached. It seems therefore useless to discuss them further here.
Passing on, we come to a series of scenes, the meaning of which is more easily intelligible. In all of these a bull plays a principal part. It is abundantly clear that this bull is no terrestrial creature, but is the Goshurun or Heavenly Bull of the Zend Avesta, from whose death come forth not only man, but beasts, trees, and all the fruits of the earth[[849]]. In the Mithraic sculptures, we see the Bull first sailing over the waters in a cup-shaped boat[[850]] like the coracles still used on the Euphrates, or escaping from a burning stable to which Mithras and a companion have set fire[[851]]. Then he is depicted grazing peaceably or raising his head now and then as if alarmed by some sudden noise[[852]]. Next he is chased by Mithras, who seizes him by the horns, mounts him[[853]], and after a furious gallop casts him over his shoulders, generally holding him by the hind legs so that the horned head dangles to the ground[[854]]. In this position, he is taken into the cave which forms the chapel of Mithras.
Here, if the order in the most complete monuments be followed, we break off to enter upon another set of scenes which illustrate the relations between Mithras and the sun[[855]]. In what again seems to be the first in order, we see Mithras upright with a person kneeling before him who, from the rayed nimbus round his head, is evidently the god Helios or Sol[[856]]. In one representation of this scene, Mithras extends his left hand towards this nimbus as if to replace it on the head of its wearer[[857]] from which it has been displaced in yet another monument[[858]], while in the other, he displays an object not unlike a Phrygian cap which may, however, be, as M. Cumont suggests, something like a water-skin[[859]]. Generally, Mithras is represented as holding this object over the bared head of the kneeling Sun-God, as if to crown him with it[[860]]. Then we find Mithras with the ray-crowned Sun-God upright beside him, while he grasps his hand in token, as it would seem, of alliance or friendship[[861]]. If we accept the hint afforded by the theory that the rock yielding water on being split by the arrows of Mithras is really a cloud producing the fertilizing rain, we may imagine that we have here the unconquered god removing clouds which obscure the face of the great life-giving luminary and restoring to him the crown of rays which enables him to shed his kindly light upon the earth. The earth would thus be made fit for the creation of man and other animals which, as we shall see, follows; but in any event, the meaning of the scene which shows the alliance is, as M. Cumont has pointed out, not doubtful[[862]]. In one monument, where Mithras grasps the hand of the person we have identified with the Sun-God before an altar, he at the same time draws his sword, as if to perform the exchange of blood or blood-covenant usual in the East on swearing alliance[[863]]. Possibly the crowning scene, as M. Cumont also suggests[[864]], is to be connected with Tertullian’s statement that in the initiation of the Mithraist to the degree of miles or soldier, he was offered at the sword’s point a crown, which he cast away from him saying that Mithras was his crown. If so, it would afford some proof that the initiate here, as in the mysteries of Isis, was made to impersonate the sun, which is on other grounds likely enough.
We return to the scenes with the Bull, which here reach their climax. This is the sacrifice of the Bull by Mithras, which forms the central point of the whole legend. Its representation, generally in bas-relief, was displayed in the most conspicuous position in the apse of the Mithraic chapel, where it occupied the place of the modern altar-piece, and such art as the Roman sculptors succeeded in displaying was employed to make it as impressive and as striking as possible[[865]]. It shows the god grasping with his left hand the nostrils of the beast, and kneeling with his left knee in the middle of the Bull’s back, while with his right hand he plunges the broad-bladed dagger with which he was armed at his birth into the Bull’s shoulder[[866]]. A dog leaps forward to lap the blood flowing from the wound, while at the same time a scorpion seizes the Bull by the genitals. A serpent also forms part of the group, but his position varies in the different monuments, while that of the other animals does not. Sometimes, he lifts his head towards the blood, as if to share it with the dog, sometimes he is extended along the ground beneath the Bull’s belly in apparent indifference to the tragedy enacted above him[[867]]. Before the Bull stands generally a youth clothed like Mithras himself in Phrygian cap, tunic, and mantle, as well as the anaxyrides or tight trousers in which the Greeks depicted most Easterns, while another youth similarly attired stands behind the dying victim. These two human figures are alike in every particular save that one of them bears a torch upright with the flame pointing upwards, while the other holds a similar torch reversed so that the flame juts towards the earth. We know from a Latin inscription that the torch-bearer with uplifted torch was called Cautes, he with the reversed one Cautopates, but of neither name has any satisfactory derivation or etymology yet been discovered[[868]].
The meaning of the group as a whole can, however, be explained by the documents of the later Persian religion. The Bundahish tells us that Ahura Mazda created before all things the Bull Goshurun, who was killed by Ahriman, the god of evil, and that from his side came forth Gayômort, first of men, while from his tail there issued useful seed-plants and trees, from his blood the vine, and from his seed the different kinds of beasts[[869]]. Save that the bull-slayer is here not the god of evil but the lord of light himself, the myth is evidently the same in the Mithraic bas-reliefs, for in some of the earliest monuments the Bull’s tail is actually shown sprouting into ears of wheat, while in others the production of animals as a consequence of the Bull’s death may be indicated, as well as the birth of the vine[[870]]. That the dog plays the part of the guardian of the Bull’s soul is probable from what we know of later Persian beliefs[[871]], while the scorpion as the creature of Ahriman may be here represented as poisoning the seed of future life at its source[[872]]. That Mithras is not supposed to kill the Bull from enmity or other personal reasons, but in obedience to orders from some higher power, is shown by the listening pose of his head during the sacrifice. This is M. Cumont’s opinion[[873]], as also that the serpent here takes no active part in the affair, but is merely a symbolic representation of the earth[[874]]. The whole drama is clearly shown as taking place in a cave or grotto, as appears from the arch of rocks which surmounts, and, as it were, acts as a frame to, the Tauroctony or bull-slaying scene in most Mithraic chapels. This cave, according to Porphyry, represents the universe.